


Written in the Scars (on Our Hearts)

by roseandheather



Category: Code Black (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-04
Updated: 2016-04-04
Packaged: 2018-05-31 06:15:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6459079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roseandheather/pseuds/roseandheather
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He hadn't expected her to be shy.</p><p>But then, everything has a cost. And the cost of her survival is written in the scars that never truly fade.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Written in the Scars (on Our Hearts)

He hadn't expected her to be shy.

He's sitting on her bed wearing only his boxers, devouring her mouth as she presses herself up against him. But when he starts to fumble at the belt of her silky kimono, she gently pushes his hands away, then slides off his lap and starts to pace. She's worrying her lower lip between her teeth, looking up at him through long dark lashes, and he schools himself to patience.

"Leanne?" he asks, as gently as he can manage. He wants - oh, _how_ badly he wants - but 'shy' is not a word he usually associates with Leanne Rorish, and the part of his brain that's still functioning knows there has to be a good reason for this now.

"The accident was... bad," she says slowly, still biting her lip. "Really bad. I had half a dozen major surgeries just to put me back together..."

In an instant, recognition flashes into his mind.

_She's talking about the scars._

He knows, in general if not in specifics, how badly she was hurt in that accident. Knows that it took her nearly a year to recover, physically at least, enough to even work a full shift, never mind pull a double or triple in the middle of a code black. Knows of the orthopedic surgeries, the laparotomies, the pins and stitched-up lacerations and endless rounds of physical therapy.

He thinks, for just a minute, of how close he came to losing her - on that fateful day, and on too many of the days to follow - and feels more than a little bit sick.

"Leanne," he says, as tenderly as he can, but in a voice that still brooks no opposition. "Sweetheart, come here."

This time she doesn't offer any resistance when he undoes the belt and pushes the fabric from her shoulders; she just stands, still biting her lip, shoulders hunched as if to ward off a blow.

"Oh, baby," he says hoarsely, and draws her to him.

It's the worst on her hips and thighs; the broad stripe of a laparotomy incision bisects her from her sternum to the brim of her pelvis, cutting through her navel. Smaller scars, none of them scalpel-straight, pepper her belly and breasts and ribs, showing the telltale tiny bumps of cross-stitch laceration repair, and he can see the unmistakable sign of a chest tube in at least two places. Thick scars wind through the muscles of her thighs, surrounded by the smaller marks of orthopedic pins that held shattered bone back together; smaller but no less vivid lines trace down her upper arms. The scars on her calves and shins are smaller and lighter, with no pin marks at all, but even the delicate arches of her feet bear traces of the accident that nearly killed her.

"Oh, _Leanne,_ " he says again, and presses his lips to her collarbone as his shoulders begin to shake.

"Ed?" she asks softly, tentatively, stroking his hair, and he wants to banish the fear in her voice, wants to wipe all the scars away with every trace of everything that has ever hurt her.

"Thank _God_ you're still here," he rasps, and then he really does begin to cry as she hugs him against her body.

That night he lays her down and worships her from her head to her feet; feathers his lips over every scar he can find, from the most obvious to the most hidden. He kisses his way down her body, searching out every mark, every scar, every long-faded bruise, telling her without words just how _grateful_ he is that she is here, tonight, with him, trusting him with this in a way she hasn't trusted anyone with her body in the long, aching years since. And as he does, he finds himself staggered all over again by just how _strong_ she is; he knows the price of these scars, knows how they can ache and pull even decades later, knows the toll they take on her mentally and physically. That she survived at all is a miracle; that she can do everything she does, survive everything she has been through, and still open herself to him this way is down to nothing short of divine intervention.

They make love in the silvery blaze of moonlight coming through the window; he won't let her shut the drapes, wants her to know beyond the shadow of a doubt that every white line and puckered bump is another precious sign of her survival, another indelible reminder that, against all the odds, he has her here in his arms tonight when half the rules of medicine state that he should have lost her on that fateful day.

And, God willing, that he'll have her there a hundred, a thousand, a decade and more's worth of nights to come.

When she straddles his hips and slides on to him he forces himself to keep his eyes open, forces himself to _look_ as she laces their fingers together and begins to ride him. She's so beautiful like this, long dark hair spilling over her shoulders and breasts, moonlight drenching her body and glittering in her eyes. She has the wide hips and still-present soft belly of a woman who's carried two children; her breasts aren't quite as firm, her body showing the signs of the life she's lived in the years before this moment. But he wouldn't trade it for anything; they've come to fit each other, they two, through loss and grief and lives long-lived before they ever found each other like this.

He doesn't think he'd have fallen in love with the Leanne she was before her body bore those scars; been her friend, yes, always that as much as her adversary, but she is not the person she was then, and he is not the person he was before Gina was stolen from him by a madman and a cruel twist of fate. They have come to fit each other's broken pieces in ways that still give them both nightmares; but perhaps, if those scars and those nightmares are the price, then Leanne rocking her hips and squeezing his hands and looking down at him like he's the gift she never thought she'd have again is the prize.

Every curse has its blessing. If Leanne is his, he'll never count the cost.

She bows to kiss him then, dusky peaked nipples brushing his chest, and he finds his hands tangling in her hair, finds his arms winding tight around her as though he can't bear to let her go.

For tonight, he can't.

She comes with a whispered curse and fingers tugging his hair; then comes again a few minutes later, panting and brushing sloppy kisses over his face, as she begins to tremble in earnest. He reaches down between them, fingers sliding betwixt and between, and when she sets her teeth in his collarbone and cries his name to the heavens, he follows her over in a dark, hot rush of bliss that drags them both down to darkness.

~*~

"Hi," he whispers several hours later, his fingers combing through the silky waterfall of her hair. It's full dark still but the moon is still shining, and she blinks up at him with hazy, sleepy, well-loved eyes.

"Mngh," she mumbles, and when he laughs it's more vibration than sound.

"Go back to sleep, sweetheart," he murmurs, his fingers tracing idle patterns on her skin - not to arouse, this time, but just to _feel_ her. "I'll still be here when you wake up."

That night, when they both sleep, neither of them dream.

**Author's Note:**

> I've wanted to write something like this for ages - something that examines the true price Leanne paid on that day. I used my imagination when it came to the specifics of her injuries, but what we already know from canon indicates that they were fairly severe. It makes sense to me that Leanne wouldn't have shared her body that way since the accident, not just from physical scars but emotional ones as well, and I wanted to focus on that, because it's not an insignificant issue. But Ed has his own share of scars, and I've often said that they have come to fit each other through grief and loss. I love to write my fluff about these two, but there is pain in their story as well, and it deserves to be acknowledged.


End file.
